Question on using DeckLink Mini Monitor 4K and Resolve

This may be very basic questions for many of you but new for me. Please assist with constructive responses.
I have been using Da Vinci Resolve for many years now but my setup was just with a dual monitor. For reference, I use a different monitor that is not connected to my Resolve computer. I just bought a DeckLink mini-monitor 4K and installed it. My 2 workstation monitors are connected to a graphics card as before. Now, I have the reference monitor connected to the DeckLink via HMDI.

Here are my questions:
(1) I am unable to access the reference monitor via Windows 10 OS. It only turns on when I'm in Resolve playback mode. Is this normal? If not, what do I have to do?

(2) How do I calibrate the reference monitor if I can only access it via Resolve? Is there other way to calibrate the monitor? I have Spyder 5 which I use to calibrate the dual monitors attached to the GPU card.

(3) Should I calibrate the dual monitors to match the reference monitor colors or the other way around?

Thanks!

So you're saying you have two monitors connected to the graphics card (presumably via DP or HDMI) and then a third "grading" monitor connected via HDMI to the DeckLink 4K card, is that correct?

If that's your configuration, then no, you won't be able to run the OS, or any other applications on the grading monitor. It's only accessible as a grading monitor from within Resolve.

I have what sounds like a similar configuration. I have three 4K monitors, one is the Asus PG27UQ DisplayHDR-1000 certified monitor, fortunately the monitor itself is factory calibrated to a tight tolerance for both color and EOTF-2084 tracking. The other two 4K monitors are older regular 4K SDR monitors.

I use an Nvidia 1080Ti graphics card with all three monitors connected via the DisplayPort interface (the superior choice due to DP's unique ability to deliver 4K/60/10b/RGB rather than HDMI 2.0a's bandwidth limitation that prevents this). I then ALSO have the Asus PG27UQ connected via HDMI from my decklink 4K mini monitor.

When I'm gaming or doing general computing I switch via the toggle switch on the Asus monitor to the DP input and use the Windows-P toggle to switch to that monitor. When I'm video editing, I flick the toggle on the monitor to HDMI input, and use the Windows-P toggle to switch to extended desktop mode. This way I have my grading monitor right in front of me connected to the decklink with the other two monitors flanking it left and right for the editing tools.

For your second question - with this configuration, no, there is no calibration option for the grading monitor, fortunately with the Asus PG27UQ calibration seems unnecessary (at least for my level of grading). If you had a more expensive monitor that enabled direct calibration input to the monitor then that would work fine, but I'm unware of any way to apply the calibration through the Decklink card - perhaps that's possible, but not something I've seen how to do.

For your third question - at least in my case the two monitors at the sides are 4K SDR sRGB monitors, the grading monitor is a BT.2020 HDR monitor - so it seems pointless and quite impossible to calibrate them to look the same, and why bother anyway, the color work is not done on the other monitors anyway.

Roland.

Roland, thanks for sharing your setup and info. That makes sense. On the third question, what you're saying is that when you grade, the colors for your grading basis is what is on your grading monitor and you don't care if it is off (or for that matter different) from the sRGB monitors.

I was told that there is a software called Calman that works with DeckLink and Resolve to calibrate monitors attached to the DeckLink. I'm going to look into that too, but am not sure if that's a process colorist do to make sure their grading monitor are calibrated.

I'm glad that your Asus PG27UQ is well calibrated from the factory. However, it was my understanding that color shifts occurs with monitors over time and they need to be recalibrated.

Right, the other displays aren't going to look the same anyway because Resolve doesn't render the content in the same way, they will look very flat by comparison. At least when editing HDR that's the case. I'm not sure about SDR.

Your comments about Calman are interesting I didn't know that was an option, I found this document:
https://app.spectracal.com/Documents/QS ... kStart.pdf

So it appears that yes, with Calman software and a colorimeter you can test through Resolve and then upload the LUT into Resolve itself - this is very interesting.

I wonder if it supports HDR. I'll ask my friends at Calman.

I found this free software. It's called DisplayCAL. It's suppose to work with DECLINK and create a calibrated LUT for Resolve and monitor connected to DECKLINK. Here's a guy showing it on YT (might be dated)…

The software can be downloaded from here...
https://displaycal.net

Has anyone use this software to calibrate their reference monitor connected on a DeckLink?

I wonder if it supports HDR. I'll ask my friends at Calman.

So getting back to this, no, unfortunately it doesn't yet.

So for HDR display calibration there still appears to be no solution.